Shannon Flynn: Want to be a Great Leader? Have the Confidence of Your Own Ideas and Articulate the Why.

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When the students from Parkland High School held their rally in Washington D.C. to memorialize the lives taken and the lives forever altered in the shooting that took place at their school in 2017, it was the first time a group of students so visibly rejected the notion that they were powerless in the face of overwhelming gun violence that had gripped the country. The line-up that day was filled with artists from Ariana Grande to Lin-Manuel Miranda to Miley Cyrus. Miley had gone through her own public struggles, but on that day, she was also channeling her alter ego Hannah Montana which is how those kids would have first come to know her. She sang The Climb:

There’s always gonna be another mountain

I’m always gonna want to make it move

Always gonna be an uphill battle

Sometimes I’m gonna have to lose

Ain’t about how fast I get there

Ain’t about what’s waiting on the other side

It’s the climb 

Shannon Flynn joined the Hannah Montana cast and crew from the beginning. First as an assistant, then as an acting coach and finally as a director of the show. For four years she created a set that gave the kids permission to ask questions and to remember that champions adjust. In many ways, her personal journey to becoming a successful director mirrored Miley’s lyrics. Shannon openly talks about how she battled imposter syndrome and had to learn to fight for her own ideas as a director. She had to learn to trust her own instincts even when she was unsure of the outcome, even if that outcome meant walking away from being a director. In her life and work, Shannon understood you have to surrender to the climb.

The lessons have served her well. When she details how to be successful in a room as the leader, she references a lesson she learned directing Sesame Street, “Honor the process, but don’t fear the process. Listen, be humble, ask for help. Then we can collaborate and make something great.”

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